The Boy Runner
by edgeforwhatitsworth
Summary: Based on a dream I had ...  Sebastian whom is an orphan faces reality in the war when he is recruited as a runner against his will.


It was a world war of some sort. Germans were bombing all over Norway. I was a young boy by the name of Sebastian. I was a Norwegian evacuee that never made it out. I was kidnapped by the Norwegian army. I wasn't the only one. There was a group of about twenty kids of all ages but none older than fifteen. All strangers to me for I did not recognise their faces. I remembered being snatched on the dark streets into a military vehicle.

We were taken to a building that was going under several repairs. It had a scaffolding all the way round the building. There were no windows just flexible plastic sheets fluttering in the wind.

There were several armed soldiers. All equipped with automatic rifles. One of them ushered me forward to the window. He was a young man. Perhaps no older than mid-twenties. He looked brave holding the rifle but in truth he was as scared as the rest of us. He took me out onto the scaffolding. From what I could see the scaffolding was all over the side of the building but it was not constructed the way normal scaffolding is, but it seemed random with all the placements of the poles and yet they were strategically placed to form some sort of obstacle course.

In the soldiers shaky voice he told me to run the course. Make it to the roof as quick as I can. I looked from his eyes to over the edge of the platform. It was a long drop and no room for error. The captured children watched me through the windows. I looked back at the solider and he impatiently urged me forward to begin the ascend to the roof. I was trembling, but had no choice. It was either die by being shot or die trying when falling into the void below. I had nothing to lose after all. I have neither family nor friends. No home to go back to. Nothing.

I took a deep breath as I faced the course. I took a run up and leapt for the first pole. I didn't think I was going to make it so I closed my eyes in mid-flight. I opened them again when I realised I had grabbed the pole. I swung to reach the next pole. This was easy I thought. Continued on and landed on another platform. Climbing ladders, running along planks of wood, swinging on rope...I did it all to get to the top where another solider made me stay while observing the rest of the children that was with me. Never had such a thrill in my life. I enjoyed it and yet at the same time I was not meant to. I was forced to watch the attempts of making it up, but only few survived. Most of them were too scared and couldn't move from the platform and was shot there and then. Others tried, but failed to succeed on holding on to the poles for dear life. They fell to their death.

Every day for weeks I was made to run that course. I got faster and faster every time as did the others that made it the first time. I learnt one night when I heard two soldiers talking about the operations they were running. We were being trained to be free running soldiers. Our purpose was to create a distraction. We were merely bait for the enemy. We run the enemy fires upon us while snipers take out the villains one by one.

At that moment a siren rose. I looked through one of the gaps in the wall. It was an air raid. Germany had started dropping bombs all over the city. Explosions in the distance. There was nothing we could do but wait it out. We weren't made to run the course during the raid. We were too valuable to lose at this stage. Especially when it's so close to our runs in the city. Few hours later, the bombing had ceased. The bombers engines had disappeared as did the explosions. All there was in the distance was dust from fallen debris and ash. Flames of the fires had met the horizon and lit the clouds with its reds, yellows and oranges. This city had fallen to the ground under the unmerciful bombers of the Germans.

I was nudged awake early in the morning. It was time for me to go out and do what I had to do. I had a part to play and that was that. I was favoured amongst the soldiers, but didn't mean I was exempt from being shot by them. It was either be shot by the allies or be shot by the enemy. I didn't have a choice. I and several others were pushed into the back of a truck and driven to a location where we had to create a diversion for the soldiers to raid a prison camp. Not only to take back their own, but they have been informed that the person in command of the German army is making his rounds to the camp and must be taken out to stop the war. All other commanding officers had been previously wiped out and no one else to take charge. Once this man is taken out, the war will be over. Norway will win and peace be restored.

All we runners took turns. Each location we were given a specific goal to run to. Each of us succeeding on every run. Finally it was my turn. I had the hardest run of all. I had to somehow make it into the camp. Guards surrounding the facility were picked off one by one. It was then I came into play to lure the guards inside out. It happened all so quickly that once I started running, I felt there was nothing that can stop me. I heard several different gun shots. Bullets running past my head as the Germans fired at me while the Norwegian snipers tagged them off of me. Troops assisting me entered the compound after I did. I stopped to catch my breath until I had a gun to my head. It was the head commander of the German army. It was game over for me. This guy had no mercy. I had heard all about him how he would kill anyone to reach the top. Politicians, his own friends and even children. He was the Judas of his country. He betrayed everyone and everything to gain power. I was merely a child who didn't possess such power to take him down. He was feared by most.

He tied me to a chair. His gun still held tightly in his right hand. He wasn't trembling nor did he have beads of sweat dripping from his brow. He feared nothing and was proud. I made the assumption that he was trying to get answers from me, however I did not understand a word he said which was all in German. I just looked at him in silence. He struck me with the butt of his pistol. Blood trickled down from the split flesh of my cheek. He constantly hit me when I didn't say a word. How could I say anything when I didn't know anything? He lost his patience and pointed his gun at me one last time. Just as he started squeezing the trigger of his weapon...

***BANG***

...Eyes flickered open. Brightly lit room. I heard the sound of people talking and footsteps. I sat up. There was a mirror by the bed I was lying on. Noticed my cheek has several stitches from the blows I got from the gun. Then it struck me. I wasn't shot. It was him. The commander. Just before I blacked out I remember the scene from back in that camp. The gun pointing at me. At my head. A bullet drilled through his head and he fell. The window had shattered slightly from the impact of the bullet going through it. A nearby sniper had locked on to my location and targeted the commander.

The war was over. The Norwegians conquered and won. I got a reward for helping. Since I was an orphan, the group in charge of me arranged for a family to take me in as one of their own. I had fought for nothing and gained a family. I never thought I'd have someone to love and now I do. And I have the love in return.

Fair trade.


End file.
